As of 13 February, there had been three reported WPV1 cases with an onset of paralysis in 2018, in Afghanistan.[62][119] Positive environmental-monitoring samples show the virus continues to circulate in Pakistan.[115] In Banadir province, Somalia, environmental samples positive for cVDPV2, related to those on the previous year, were again detected, confirming circulation of the virus.[115]
A public health effort to eliminate all cases of poliomyelitis (polio) infection around the world, begun in 1988 and led by the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the Rotary Foundation,[1] has reduced the number of annual diagnosed wild polio cases from the hundreds of thousands to 22 in 2017.
For a polio virus to be certified as eradicated world-wide, at least three years of good surveillance without cases needs to be achieved,[56] though this period may need to be longer for a strain like WPV3, where a lower proportion of those infected demonstrate symptoms.[57]
Oral polio vaccine is highly effective and inexpensive (about US$0.10 per dose, or US$0.30 per child[12]) and its availability has bolstered efforts to eradicate polio.
See Wikipedia for more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poliomyelitis_eradication#2018
Keith N. Larsen - Lincoln NE 